Idaho has 29,000 children living in households and being cared for by relatives, accounting for seven percent of children in our state. To acknowledge these special relative adults and the children they care for, the Idaho KinCare Project is proud to announce its third annual statewide children’s art contest known as “My Family. My Story.”

“My Family. My Story. 2013” is a statewide art contest open to children living in KinCare families—families in which a relative or other significant adult is raising a child. KinCare children can compose a poem, write a short essay or draw a picture that describes how living with someone other than their parents has made a positive difference in their life.

Entry forms may be downloaded from the Idaho CareLine 211 KinCare site: www.211.idaho.gov/kincare/myfamilymystory.html, or may be obtained by mail by calling the Idaho CareLine at 211. Entries can be submitted through May 31, 2013. The top two winners in each age division will win a $100 prize. At the close of the contest, entries will be published in a book and distributed to all participants.

The contest is in its third year. Among last year’s winners was Angela, age 12, who wrote, “When I was a little girl I didn’t understand why my sister and I lived with our grandparents. But now that I am older I understand that my mother could not care for us so we went to live with them. If they had not we could’ve ended up in foster care, split up or worse. If we would have been split up we would not have known or remembered each other.”

For more information on the "My Family. My Story. 2013" art contest, please call the Idaho CareLine at 211, visit our website at www.211.idaho.gov/kincare/Kincare.html, contact VISTA volunteer Norma Barrientos by phone at 208-442-9977 or by email at BarrienN@dhw.idaho.gov. To view last year’s entries and winners, please click here.